326 SHIPPING AND TRANSPORTING DEES. 



them with some brood and combs. A two-comb nucleus pro- 

 vided with a liberal supply of bees and put into a shipping 

 box of right size and of light weight, may be sent to great 

 distance and will build a very fair colony if purchased at 

 the opening of the clover harvest and properly cared for and 

 supplied with combs already built. 



600. How many bees are there in a pound? This ques- 

 tion has been propounded to us several times. L'abbe Collin, 

 by careful experiments, found that in a normal condition it 

 takes about 6,100 bees to weigh a pound; while in the swarrn, 

 when they are supplied with honey, it takes less than 4,300. 



According to Bernard De Gelieu, their weight will vary 

 from 3,640 to 5,460. He ascertained that, m a good season, 

 a thousand bees carried in about an ounce of honey from the 

 field, at each trip. 



The same writer, testing the weight of drones found that 

 about 2,000 weighed a pound. This was verified by the tests 

 of Prof. B. r. Koons, of Connecticut, quoted in the A B C 

 of Bee Culture. 



But Collin, who was very accurate in these matters, tested 

 drones, both at their leaving the hive and at their return from 

 the field and found that the outgoing drones number about 

 1,950 to the pound, while the returning drones number 2,100; 

 which shows a loss of nearly eight per cent in their weight, 

 through the taking of their daily exercise. This is evidently 

 caused by their discharging their excrements and gives a faint 

 idea of the amomit of food they must consume while in the 

 hive, for they also discharge their excrements in the hive 

 (190), without much regard to propriety. It also confirms 

 the fact that they harvest nothing but always come home with 

 an appetite. 



601. Parties contemplating the breeding of bees and 

 queens for sale, will do well to locate themselves as far South 

 as convenient for easy shipment, as it is by far more lucrative 

 to raise them there than in the North. This is very easy to 

 understand. In the South, the bees usually winter safely, and 



